Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Música de Queso

Last Friday I went to the lovely town of Aranjuez, famous for inspiring the Concierto de Aranjuez by Joaquin Rodrigo, but the music I saw performed there was considerably more cheesy than that... Miguel Bosé celebrating 30 years in the music business with a free concert that went on long past midnight. I'd never heard of him but he's a legend here and the women in the audience went wild. He's certainly a showman and although pop isn't my thing there was enough soul and fire to keep me interested.

I was due to depart Madrid at the end of August for regions in the north, but my plans have changed somewhat, as my new girlfriend lives here and I'm reluctant to leave her! I think I'll hang around a little longer before going to Portugal. I'm working on a farm near Carrapateira in October, so I have a whole month free, subject to my finances, which are dwindling rapidly...

There has been some literary activity during my time in Madrid. The seven interconnected stories I began writing in the Alpujarras are all finished and I'm very pleased with them. So tightly are these stories linked that I'm tempted to call the series a novella and publish it in that form. If that happens, the overall title will be The Court of Fictional But Very Serious Crimes and the individual pieces will become 'chapters' rather than true stories. The titles of these seven pieces are as follows:(1) Lettuce Prey(2) Azure Like It(3) Black Toffee Glues(4) Tarzan at the Apple's Core(5) Where Angels Fear to Bake Bread(6) Pleasure For Treasure(7) Riders of the Purple Mezzotint

This leaves me free to start my Bedsteads Across Iberia novel, but first I have ideas for three or four short stories I want to pin down... In the meantime, returning to the subject of music, I note a new video by the glorious Natacha Atlas, one of the finest music videos I've ever seen, a visual extravaganza that says in images a lot of what I try to say in words!

Uplands is still the music capital of south west wales - see the blog for some recent gig excitement including the tales of a recent trip to Brecon; a very Uplands wedding; and the time I met a certain Mariner.

Also check out the pictures on Huw's blog (if you haven't already)- I took 'em....